Experiments in Democracy : Participative Decision Making in the Environmental and Biotechnological Dilemmas

Democracy in the EU is in the state of crisis. Lowering turnout, longer legitimacy and accountability chain, more interdependent world and bigger than ever before science input to policy-making. There is number of possible solutions for that problem but the most promising is democratic governance. Active public involvement in decision-making process is a chance for higher legitimacy of legislation and renewed democratic commitment. Institutions such as Consensus Conference or Citizen Summit try to balance the tradeoff between public fear and experts input to produce the most appropriate policy. These institutions are novel and need to be assess to clear if they are a progress in democratic society or just another failed experiment. From the available date the picture is mixed. These institutions certainly involve public and help to create a forum to exchange opinions between citizens, politicians and experts. On the other hand their impact to actual policy-making is still negligible. The future developments will determine the fate of these institutions and their role in the democratic process.